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Today is a FREE taste of an Insight Politics article by writer John Black.
My Son Hunter: The Movie They Don’t Want You to See
My Son Hunter is a movie that shouldn’t exist. Not because it’s terrible (it’s just pretty bad) but because a work of popular entertainment shouldn’t have to do the job it strains to do. If the media hadn’t been derelict in their duty to report without fear or favour, if the security state hadn’t closed ranks to protect their preferred Presidential candidate and if Big Tech hadn’t followed suit with censorship, there would be no need for this movie. But as it stands, My Son Hunter is the only long-form retelling that exists of the facts in the case of Hunter Biden – playboy, drug addict and middleman for murky dealings with foreign kleptocrats. That they are delivered with a side order of red-state propaganda is regrettable – this won’t convince the wavering moderate. These facts should speak for themselves.
The movie opens with Biden senior taking a leisurely dip in his indoor swimming pool before enjoying another of his pass-times – inhaling lady hair. The lady he inflicts this on is a fictional female secret service agent who narrates some of the film.
The film then switches to footage of the BLM riots and social justice warriors parroting lefty nostrums: ‘Choose truth over facts’ and ‘We are on the right side of history’. Immediately one of the main problems with the film is apparent – an awkward shifting between goofy comedy and ominous political comment.
Then we begin an extended introduction to party boy Hunter and his dissolute lifestyle. A lot of drugs and semi-naked strippers (my wife walked past the TV at this point and didn’t seem entirely convinced at my explanation of what I was watching). These sequences suffer from another of the film’s limitations: its low production value. I have no idea of the budget but the amateurish lighting and limited sets – a long scene set in Biden’s SUV stands out – suggests it wasn’t high. The first twenty minutes have the feel of an episode of Red Shoe Diaries or another of those ‘erotic dramas’ shown on cable TV in the 90s, heavy on sleazy saxophones and silhouettes of the female form.
What saves the film is the performance of Laurence Fox as Hunter. Known as the founder of the Reclaim party in the UK (basically the cultural wing of UKIP) he obviously shares the filmmakers’ politics, but his dramatic skills are a bonus. He manages to elicit sympathy for Hunter as a man-baby, an unloved second son (his much more upright brother, Beau, died from a brain tumour) and a pitiable slave to his multiple vices. He certainly had it rough: losing not only his brother, but much earlier, his sister and mother in a car crash. Of course, there are plenty of people who suffer calamities early in life and don’t become drug-addicted screw-ups. It is only the pampered sons and daughters of the elite who are indulged this option.
This study in psychology sits uneasily with an investigation into Hunter’s labyrinthine business dealings. Each revelation is heralded by a ‘FACT CHECK’ title exploding onto the screen. Our narrator of these is a blonde hooker with an unlikely knowledge of high finance and Chinese human rights abuses. But this is the guts of the film, detailing how the Biden boy became a ‘consultant’ to huge Chinese and Ukrainian energy companies without any discernible relevant skill set. Unless you count the ‘skill’ of being the son of a vice-president. The infamous laptop(s) (there were two) revealed these companies paid him $11 million for…what exactly?
This is where facts dry up and speculation starts. The reference in one email of a deal that gave ‘10% for the big guy’ along with the senior Biden’s role in guaranteeing $1 billion of aid to the Ukraine suggests quid pro quo corruption. At the very least Hunter was knee deep in unethical if not illegal influence peddling. And he had the motivation – the laptops also revealed he was spending US $200,000 a month during this period – mainly on an out-of-control drug habit.
All this should have been front-page news, not left to be explained by a woman of easy virtue in a movie two years after the fact. But that’s how it goes in clown world.
The masses will remain ignorant due to these truths being buried in a partisan film (produced by uber-Right website Breitbart) that freely mixes fact with fantasy. The ending of the film doubles down on the later, imagining an alternative reality where the laptop story is taken up by the media and the 2020 election is won by Trump.
Cinema as political wish fulfilment.
While a documentary would be more suitable for the seriousness of the content, in our current culture war climate, narrative propaganda may be the way to go. As Hollywood becomes increasingly woke, spurning heartland America and its values, conservative America is beginning to respond with movies of its own. The Daily Wire (part-owned by Ben Shapiro) has already produced two thrillers.
I wonder if we could do the same thing here in New Zealand? I look forward to The BFD-produced Credit Card, Cash or Koha? The Nanaia Mahuta Story. In fact, I might even start writing the script…
If My Son Hunter sounds like your cup of tea it’s available from the website mysonhunter.com for a hefty $21 US or from a half dozen dodgy websites that I couldn’t possibly recommend (‘cough’ 123movies ‘cough’).
Predictably (oh so predictably), reviews have been unanimously terrible, focusing on the film’s politics and not its artistic merit. ‘A right-wing grift’ (Salon.com) ‘for fringe lunatics’ (The Guardian) ‘cruel and unusual punishment’ (the ironically named Independent).
That’s the best reason for seeing the movie: because these bastards are telling you not to.
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